All forms of MenInRed97's soccer analysis.
With less than four weeks to go before Gregg Berhalter’s first competitive match at the helm of the Chicago Fire, the team has continued to make moves to rework a roster that finished dead last in the MLS Eastern Conference last season. The most recent move was a somewhat
This morning, the Chicago Fire completed the transfer of French-Ivorian winger Jonathan Bamba from Spanish side Celta de Vigo with a contract running until the 2027 MLS Season. He will occupy one of two open DP spots on the team. For lovers and watchers of the game of European
Having announced the signing of Côte d’Ivoire international Jonathan Bamba to a Designated Player deal, the team’s plans for how it will play in 2025 are becoming clearer. Although the Bamba signing is all but certainly not the last move for Director of Football Gregg Berhalter in his
The Chicago Fire opened their 2025 preseason schedule on Sunday, facing Brazilian Serie A contender Fortaleza in a warm Port St. Lucie. A hodge-podge Fire lineup took the field in the first unofficial match under Head Coach Gregg Berhalter, and despite a narrow 1-0 loss, it was not
In a rapidly moving story yesterday, rumors out of Saudi Arabia – which eventually became reports from the United States and France – have linked the Chicago Fire with Brazilian superstar Neymar Jr., currently of Al-Hilal in Saudi Arabia, with L’Equipe reporting that Fire and MLS executives have met with
The new year is here, signaling the MLS offseason is coming to an end: the Fire’s first announced preseason game is set to take place on February 5th as part of the Coachella Valley Invitational tournament and players will be reporting to training camp in more of a matter
The New Year is often a time for a fresh start. For the Chicago Fire, that fresh start started back in October with the hiring of new Director of Football and Head Coach Gregg Berhalter. After five years under Georg Heitz, the arrival of Berhalter has reignited excitement for the
The 2025 MLS regular season Schedule is set, and the Fire know their opponents and when they’ll be facing them. Although many facets of the MLS schedule remain unchanged – it is still 34 games long, still set to start the last week in February and end, somewhat awkwardly, following
Gastón Giménez’s return to South America via mutual contract termination has numerous impacts for the Fire and the team’s roster as the club looks to retool under new Director of Football Gregg Berhalter. The move comes as somewhat of a surprise following repeated rumors over several years that
For the first time in league history, MLS has published the amount of available General Allocation Money (GAM) for each team. Alongside the Designated Player (DP) rule, the U22 initiative and Targeted Allocation Money (TAM), GAM is one of several accounting mechanisms invented by the league that allows teams to
Tasked with overhauling a roster that finished 28th out of 29 teams in MLS, it would have been understandable if Gregg Berhalter, Gregg Broughton and the team’s sporting department focused their attention during MLS’s short offseason on reworking the first team, leaving Fire II, the team’s reserve
The international break is in full flow, and for the U.S. Men’s National Team, the Mauricio Pochettino era has commenced. Poch’s debut win against Panama on Saturday officially turned the page on Gregg Berhalter’s tenure, which ended this summer; at the same time, last week’s
Gregg Berhalter’s arrival at the Chicago Fire this week has sparked conversation not just in the Windy City but throughout all of American soccer. The former U.S. Men’s National Team manager, who was ceremoniously fired following this summer’s Copa América embarrassment, is looking both to restore
Gregg Berhalter is best known for his tenure as the head coach of the U.S. Men’s National Team, but before the 51-year-old manager took the reins of the USMNT, he was Head Coach and Sporting Director of the Columbus Crew from 2014-2018, a role he
Yesterday, the Chicago Fire turned heads around Major League Soccer with the announcement that the club had named former USMNT coach Gregg Berhalter as director of football and head coach. The news comes just days after the team’s elimination from playoff contention for the seventh successive season. Before Berhalter
With the Fire officially eliminated from postseason contention, in a macro sense, the season is over. That isn’t to say that there are no stakes for the team in the final weeks of the season. Here are some storylines for both the team and individual players to keep an
